New Damper and Cap for a Verscamm SP-300v - Fitting Insturctions Required

I have a Roland Versacamm SP-300v and have recently had considerable problems with ink flow. I have been advised, by a UK based service engineer, that I need a new yellow damper and cap. I have been quoted just over £500 to have the parts supplied and fitted! I feel this is too much to pay in the current economic climate.

I have no experience of fitting such parts. Does anyone have a PDF guide, or video guide for fitting new Dampers and Caps into a Versacamm SP-300v?

Replies to This Discussion

Hello Collin - cannot speak to the pound conversion or the price to get the captop and damper to you. Not sure why they would be telling you both - you can inspect the damper visually for dents or leaks and then it would be requiring replacement. As for the captop they are rated for 8 months but if you take care of them can last up to 3 to 4 years. As some folks are now cringing at that statement - some of us out here in the field knows. The captop is an easy replacement and can be handled by the user. Check your email for a dropbox share from bluealert_llc@yahoo.com in there will be the PDF for changing of your captop and the user manual for your machine. Post a picture of your test print if you want that evaluated prior to doing the job.

Thanks Irving! I already have the capping station guide. By any chance do you have the guide to change the dampers station?. I need to change both pieces, cap and dampers and my dealer is charging me $900 for that. For me is a lot of money right now.

Thank you for your prompt response, and for the information provided. I've downloaded the PDF documents using dropbox, these are most helpful. The Captop replacement seems fairly straightforward, I'm a little confused with the damper, I couldn't see any guidelines for changing this. I've been further advised that I will need to use a syringe to draw off ink cross contamination, the magenta seems to have completely taken over the yellow output, please see attached jpg image of recent test print. Any further advice would be very much appreciated.

The cross contamination is your captop. I am trusting you are not under warranty so you might as well open the cover to the heads and visually inspect the yellow damper. I am sending you a private message. Print a history report - check the manual for how. - put a copy of that in the drop box.

Hector no such luck. The dampers replacement are in the service manual which we do no distribute on this site. The damper attaches to the manifold by way of a nipple which is very sensitive. If that is snapped then you have to replace entire head or remove head and replace manifold. If you are not a bull in a china shop you maybe able to do it but you will be going it along. Of course I can make suggestions, but when you pay the dealer you are buying security.

So lets take a step back, because you went from captop to dampers. So in VC 101, lets start troubleshooting 101 - what are you trying to do - what are the syptoms you are trying to correct. To just throw parts at it is not the best financial approach. What is it doing or not doing? I am guessing ink starvation - captop should correct that and if not - then you might have got air in your lines and it is blocked at the damper (you can look to see if you have ink in the damper). Using a syringe could correct that problem. So get back and I might have some less drastic rememedies.

Ok; this is the problem; the last month my sp540 stop printing the yellow color; after a few cleaning start to print again, then stop printing yellow and magenta; but if I print around 3 feet of pure yellow; the printing start to print almost perfect. So after take a look in a lot of forums and talk with my dealer. The problem is suppose to be the capping and the dampers. I bought a pair of capping station. Today I change the capping station without any problem, but the machine right now is not printing any color. Just a blur gray. I'm making a few medium cleaning to see what happen. Sorry for ask for help here; but internet is the only solution that I have right now. I know that my dealer is selling knowledge and security but I can't afford that in this moment.

There has been times when I had not run my machine for 15 days, especially if I had a heavy install schedule. As that is not the case these days my machine runs regularly. You have less of a problem with the SP/VP models. I have been using the same captops for 4 years. This does not work for everyone (environment plays a big part), but a clogged captop could cause your issue.

I do not know what you know or who taught you your machine. You have two power buttons, the main on the back and the subpower in the front. If you are turning off the main, that could cause your problem. Also it sounds more as if you have an airlock in your lines. If you can get a syringe even from the same dealer, before you do the dampers (you can do a visual inspection to see if you at least have ink in it, you can draw the ink into the head and remove the air. Facing your machine on the right side, remove cover and remove lower cover (same are where you remove to get to the captop tubing. Look for the same y connector where you attached the new hose for the captop. SP two heads -two captops - black/cyan and magenta/yellow- attach syringe to the Y connector to that hose and draw the syringe until you get the yellow ink. If you pull until it is full of air and no ink, clamp off, release the air in the syringe and start again.

The same thing happened to me a couple of months back and to another friend in Califonia about a week ago, both times with the yellow ink.